Sunday, December 31, 2006

went out for a great/crippling armbike ride yesterday! carrol cnyn. was really nice,really testing the threshhold of my armbiking abilities! i actually rode down the man made rock pile pictured, denise did not get a pic as she said that "she was so stressed out she might have a heart attack". but, she was really stoked afterwards. sedona will make you tough, quick! steve.

Friday, December 29, 2006

spilled some HOT coffee on my knee yesterday and this was the result! so, all you kids out there, be careful when you hold your coffee cup between your knees and pour coffee outta your old-fashoned perculator where it is about a million degrees or this will be the result. then, in the shop i grabbed a tube so hot it made a cloud of smoke! but, my hands are so leathery from armbiking/framebuilding/wheelchairing/crutching i didn't ever get a blister, just took my prints off. be careful out there! steve.

Monday, December 25, 2006

finally remembered to bring the camera on an armbike ride! this one took us to turkey creek trail in sedona. it climbs 1000ft. in 3 miles up the north face of house mtn. with great views of the red rock country. although it starts out pretty wide, as you get higher it turns to flagstone ledges and finally, when you hit the pinyon/juniper, it turns to really pretty lava with some great lichen. just hanging out for the holidaze, trying to catch up on the ever lengthening bike order list, right now i have one back from paint, 2 at paint, 1 ready to go to paint but waiting for a fork, and one i'm still polishing, day 2. busy. interest in frameblocks has really took off, i'm quite surprised, many are allready sold when i get them! as soon as i get them out, i have some more ideas for framebuilding tools that i'm gonna get made for sale. how do people get bored? man, that's something i don't get. i could keep 4 steve garros busy! thanks for checking out my blog! i'm trying to keep it interesting. also, if you do not have a blog, or post an anonymous comment, i cannot reply to you, but i really appreciate the comments/feedback! steve.

Thursday, December 21, 2006

they just changed blogger around, so i hope this works out...just taking a break, having my afternoon pot oh coffee...well, o.k., it's only half a pot of coffee, but it's a big pot. gotta have some thing to wash the baclophen and lyrica down with. i find that your anti-spacmotics and your nerve meds go soooo much better with some franch roast! been super busy lately, got in one last armbike ride before it snowed up here, did moto/pipeline/dogfood/schultz creek. and was totally blown. can't wait to go again, getting sorta cabin feeverish around here. might go armbiking on sat. or kayaking at roosevelt lake next week. been working on getting some frame blocks made, they hold tubing while you work on it. response has been good, i think the first run will be sold before i even get them. also, gonna have a pic in the new patagonia catalog of my ugly mug building frames! boy, they will put anyone in those things! and, the 2nd time, too! seriously, this shows dawn kish can make anyone presentable! they send you a nice bonus for the pics, so it looks like we can get some new paddling tops.....cool. got this frame back from paint, and i really dig the color with the gold flecks. it's going to zurich with a matching vulture cycles fork.{thanks, wade!} and, a pic of yours truly. lookin' pretty worked, huh! been a rough year.....thanks for reading, steve.

Tuesday, December 12, 2006

sorry, mimbres man, the frame has gone to an anonymous buyer....somebody is getting a damn nice x-mas present! also, some sweet fillets a put down today on michelle's bike. and i got an awesome stained glass window from jodi in virginia! she ownes a coconino mtb, and is getting her 2nd coconino soon, a road bike for the beautiful blue ridge mtns. thanks, jodi! nice work! steve.

Monday, December 11, 2006

howdy, all, thanks for tuning into the garro channel! been leaving the chair at home and walking every where! {with crutches, of course..} went to the doctor's office, p.t., the post office, the grocery store, coffee shop, all over! still cooking and building bikes in the chair. i'm still too sketchy for that stuff still. also cruising around with the "canadian" crutches, like the ones in the pic. this is great news, as it is MUCH easier to go places with out the chair. things are coming along! hard to belive that a year ago at garropalooza i weighed 115lbs and could only move one toe. what a crazy year...i don't expect anyone to even guess what it was like...alot of folks say it was a miracle, but that is pure 100% b.s., perseverence, stubbornness and work ethic are what it was/is. that and denise sticking with me and not giving up. so on to the pics: the frame in the jig is my sister-in-laws x-bike. it is sweeeeet! this one's going to the north american handmade bike show in san jose in march. the other frame is a full-on 700c cross/touring frame for sale. brand new. $700 painted any color you want. 18.5" seattube center to center. 23.5" effective tt. 1-speed or geared, handbent tt and ss's, full touring braze-ons and bottle opener. 3 bottle cages. sweeeet. e-mail me if you are interested at coconinocycles@yahoo.com also, a pic of me cruising around, and lastly, the "frankenbender" built for me by doug hall and his bro for some heavy-duty bending! rode budda beach the other day as well, but forgot the camera. rode up some near vertical slickrock on the handbike, and did the ride out-and-back from the little horse trailhead to the drop off to the creek and back, 3 1/2 hours total, it totally worked me, i could barely roll myself over or talk, went to bed by 6pm. whew! that shit is tough! once again, thanks for reading the crazy comic strip that is my life! rock on, steve.

Saturday, December 09, 2006

first try in the kayak went really well! me & denise can build it in 30min. no problem, 1st try. stayed dry and warm, even though it was cold enough that what little of the lake that was unfrozen was re-freezing pretty rapidly. the only other folks in flag who thought it was a fine day for boatin' turned out to be brock and brian reibe, trying out brock's new fishing boat, he was hotrodding back and forth in the icefree zone with a 50 horse on his 14 ft. fishing boat. had a great time, saw 6 bald eagles, a heron and a bunch of ducks. can't wait to get it on some bigger warmer water. check out longhaulfoldingkayaks.com thay make some fine products! going armbiking today, post some pics later tonight! thanks for reading! steve.

Friday, December 01, 2006

went to sedona yesterday and did stutz/post trail as a sedona tryout. i'm sore! you can climb up impossibly steep stuff, or you are brawling with the rubble just struggling to scrabble along. good stuff! went down the "ditch trail" until the ditch got 12" wide and 5' deep and had to turn around, but was able to ride/scrabble out. burly! getting pretty strong! been building lots of bikes, probally realistically backed up a year. posted a shot of the armbike cockpit, folks wonder how it works. the black chest pad steers while you pedal, and the bars are for downhill. i made the h2o mount, and converted it to 7 speed, and put on the sweet bmx grips. i put thorn resistant slime tubes in all around, adding alot of weight to the rig, but flats really suck! later, steve.

SO, WHAT'S THIS ALL ABOUT, THEN?

Hi! my name is Steve Garro, and this blog is an ongoing chronical of the process of building the finest handmade bicycles I can here at Coconino Cycles, located in beautiful Flagstaff, Arizona.

I'm a one man operation, doing all the design and fabrication in house with my own hands. we have been operating full time since feburary 2003, producing about 20-25 frames a year, as well as handbuilt wheelsets and complete bike builds. every bike is totally custom fit to the needs and measurements of each rider and built from scratch with hand selected tubesets from several premium manufactuers including True Temper, Dedacciai and Kaisei. I pride myself on perfect fit, ride quality, and durability to provide you with the best cycling experence I can. to know more details, check out my web page, http://www.coconinocycles.com/

Please note that as of 1/14 I had a roughly one amd a half year backlog on orders. I have since stopped taking deposits to catch up on work until January 2015

When looking through my blog, you will also see alot of details of my life and pictures of things I like to do and stuff that I think is cool, like handcycling, fishing, boating, friends and family, critters, landscape, and flowers, with some wierd stuff thrown in for good measure. enjoy, and thanks for stopping by - Steve